Cottrell House is an enterprise space in Wembley set up by Meanwhile Space and initiated by Brent Council to support local start-up businesses and entrepreneurs with affordable workspace.

Cottrell House overlooks the fast paced, large scale development of Wembley City and is almost invisible amongst the shadows of it's grand structures. In these shadows, meanwhile projects like Cottrell House are providing local alternatives to inaccessible and intangible large scale development.

For this project The Decorators worked with Meanwhile Space to convert the ground floor of a prominent, long term vacant, building on Wembley Hill Road.

This former retail unit was rearranged to provide a small cafe, one shared studio for rent, eight fixed desks for hire and hot-desking space, catering for different needs and budgets.

The space was built with volunteers from Meanwhile Space's Coming Soon Club, who gave time to the project in exchange for free membership days at Cottrell House.

The design of the space responds to the context of Wembley, whose landscape is regularly transformed by the large scale events of Wembley stadium.

A central round table with the profile of the stadium was built to give room to the many other things Wembley has to offer beyond its football matches.

The self-contained desk units can be wheeled outside and reconfigured as market stalls to provide an opportunity for makers of Wembley to sell and promote their work.

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Suzanne O'Connell of The Decorators introduces the studio's temporary restaurant in a local market and a community event on top of a multi-storey car park.
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